Yesterday marked the first day of this year's TV Turnoff Week, which runs April 21-27. If you weren't aware of this, well, I didn't know either until Monday night, and by then I'd already made plans to watch Gossip Girl and my DVR-ed recording of last week's Battlestar Galactica. But I think that Tuesday, April 22, is a much better day to start TV Turnoff Week, because tonight is the premiere of a huge turn-off: A Shot at Love 2.

So instead of tuning in to whatever disasters await Tila Tequila during her second quest for "true love," here are a few suggestions for what you can do instead.

1. Go out to dinner with your girlfriend(s) and have some lively conversation. There are so many lesbian chefs these days that you can surely find a restaurant headed by one of them. If you're in Miami Beach, stop by Tantra to taste the cuisine of executive chef Sandee Birdsong. If you're in San Francisco, how about Elizabeth Falkner's newest restaurant, Orson? She was a guest judge on Top Chef last season and has been a contestant on Iron Chef, and she rocks some platinum blond hair.

If you're in Chicago, stop by Avec, where head chef (and recent Top Chef guest judge) Koren Grieveson presides. No, Grieveson hasn't come out to us officially, but as Dorothy Snarker noted in her recap, she's sports all the requisite lesbian paraphernalia; her Food & Wine profile notes that she was a soldier in the U.S. Army for nine years; and in this Time Out Chicago article she says that her place of inspiration is "My girl Frog's studio. ... We bounce ideas off each other, but really, just working next to her keeps me inspired." Hey, Koren: How about an interview with AfterEllen.com? … continue reading

Food. Competition. Food. Hot women. Food. Really, what’s not to love? I can’t wait for Bravo’s Top Chef finale tonight, and I don’t mind telling you that I am all in with team Casey.

Not that I have anything against Dale and his mini-hawk cuteness. Sadly, I cannot say the same for Hung. That dude needs to get taken down a rung, or 12. If he wins, they’ll have to change the title to Insufferable Chef instead. … continue reading

After the heads up in Best. Lesbian. Week. Ever. I was all set to cheer on my primary rooting interest, Sandee Birdsong, on Bravo's competitive reality TV show Top Chef. I was prepared to “take one for the team,” so to speak, and do something I have relatively little interest in doing, and that's watching someone cook. Generally speaking, watching someone cook is almost equivalent, not quite but almost, to watching someone iron shirts or wash and fold clothes. It all seems very labor-intensive, and labor is tough for me, especially if I think someone is going to ask me to help them. But this being TV, I knew I was safe from that possibility. So I got over my fears and was excited to cheer Sandee on to victory! But Sandee was unfairly, unjustly, un-everythingly sent home in the second week! (I don't care if it wasn't BBQ. None of those people BBQed, they grilled!)

So why am I still watching this show?

Her name is Padma Lakshmi.

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